"Judgment is merciless to one who has not shown mercy"

If you saw the docudramaseries (See? Anyone can make their own homemade portmanteau*!) "We Own This City," you remember the rampant crime family that terrorized the city of Baltimore for several years. City police were reluctant to do anything about these marauders because...the marauders were themselves city police.

And, remember, this was a true story, not something made up in Hollywood. The leader of the syndicate that operated as the "Gun Trace Task Force" was a preening strutter named Sgt. Wayne Jenkins, whose main goal was amassing a huge fortune by stuffing the steel cans buried in his backyard with stolen money. Jenkins, now known as "#62928-037," is a guest at a federal prison in Kentucky But another officer in the motley crew, Daniel Hersl, was regarded as the nastiest of the nasty, a boy who came up from the rough streets of East Baltimore, donning blue and brutalizing his former neighbors to an extent that even surprised his fellow cops. 

When the merciless beg for some mercy.

Hersl is serving an 18-year federal prison sentence, and last year, he was given the worst news: terminal cancer is killing him. So last fall, he asked a judge if he could be excused from prison because he wanted to spend time with his young son before death takes him away.

The judge turned him down.

So now, back comes Hersl. He says he wants to take responsibility and apologize for what he did on the streets and courtrooms. Remember, these rogues went down for racketeering (for stealing money from people), lying to investigators, filing false paperwork and making fraudulent overtime claims.

Federal court records show an email Hersl sent to his attorney containing these words:   

  "This horrible disease has allowed me to do some soul searching, and I believe that, at this point in my life, it is time to do what is best for me and so many others that the GTTF may have affected. I'm truly sorry for the way myself and others that I worked with acted and treated others during our time as police officers ... I know it has been over seven years since the GTTF scandal occurred, and, to my knowledge, I have still not heard anyone apologize to the public or to the justice system for our actions."

So he decides to be the bigger man, saying, "I accept full responsibility for my conduct."

The time to accept full responsibility for his actions was the day he pinned on the badge he soon disgraced. Today, he is accepting the results of his failure to do so.

* a portmanteau is a term for a new word created by fusing two old ones, such as "breathalyzer" (breath analyzer) or "fortnight" (two weeks of fourteen nights).  Originally, a portmanteau was a French suitcase that opens into two parts.